Desmond Chair of Early Childhood Education and Director of the Early Childhood Research Centre (ECRC) at Dublin City UniversityEpisode 13, Professor Mathias Urban

Professor Mathias Urban, Desmond Chair of Early Childhood Educate and Director of the Early Childhood Research Centre at DCU is Louise’s guest.

He talks about DCU’s decision to use a donation from Mr Dermot Desmond to set up the only dedicated research centre at university level in Ireland that looks at questions around early childhood from an interdisciplinary angle.

He tells Louise about early childhood education and care being a fundamental part of the education system in Ireland and they talk about the factors that impact on childrens’ lives, including malnutrition and housing.

Prof Urban tells Louise about the teachers who inspired him and how with the work he is doing, ‘we're preparing the next generation of teachers, but also researchers and hopefully policymakers in this field.”

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Louise:
Hello, and welcome to the Teachers Inspire podcast. Organised and run by Dublin City University, Teachers Inspire is an Ireland wide initiative that seeks to celebrate teachers and to recognise the transformative role they play in our lives and in our communities.

My name is Louise O'Neill and I am delighted that I have been asked once again to curate, and share with you, the many uplifting stories about teachers who have made a difference in your life. Check out these stories and more on the website, Teachersinspire.ie

Joining me now is Professor Mathias Urban. He is Desmond Chair of Early Childhood Education and is also director of the Early Childhood Research Center at DCU’s Institute of Education.

Welcome to the Teachers Inspire podcast and thank you for joining us in studio today.

Mathias:
Thanks for having me.

Louise:
Okay, so I just introduced you there as the Desmond Chair of Early Childhood Education in the Institute of Education. Can you just tell me, like, a little bit about that role and what it involves?

Mathias:
Well, it's actually quite an interesting construct this Desmond Chair and you have to get give DCU quite a lot of credit for this. How this came about was that DCU received a very generous donation from a donor - from Dermot Desmond - which DCU strategically decided to put into early childhood, to create this professorship, this chair and with it to set up the original research centre, which is the only dedicated research centre at university level in Ireland looking at questions of early childhood, from an interdisciplinary angle.

I was working in London at the time, I was Professor of Early Childhood Studies at the University of Roehampton in London and applied for the position, (and) got offered the position.

What it really is, is to, is to emphasis the importance of early childhood education and care as the very fundamental part of the education system in Ireland as the first engagement of very young children with the wider society and making sure that this is represented in terms of research, in terms of policy work and in terms of working with practice at university level. So that's basically what this is about.

And we're doing this at many different levels. We're doing this locally, we work with practitioners, educators, family resource centres here locally in various parts of Dublin.

But we also work at very high international level in terms of global early childhood policies and systems mainly.

And what we're trying to do with this chair and with the centre, with our research, is to combine the local and the global very systematically.

Louise:
And you said there you were working in London, like what was the appeal of coming to Ireland?

Mathias:
Well, I kind of knew what I was signing up to (it) because I've been in and out of Ireland for many years, I've been working with partners and organisations and policy in Ireland since… the early 2000s, let's put it that way. So, I knew a lot about Ireland from the point of view of a sympathetic outsider.

I knew that the Irish early childhood landscape is a very dynamic one, to put it that way, and that there are major changes would be coming along the way and it was extremely tempting to be part of that development and to be able to set up this research practice policy, construct the centre and try and inform what was going on and how, the future directions we might take in this field.

Louise:
And in Ireland, like how do we measure up against other countries? I mean, obviously, you know, you've worked in in London, but you know, you're from Germany, like how do we measure up against other countries in Europe when it comes to early childhood education?

Mathias:
Well, I suppose, (I’m) learning, still learning how Ireland works, actually.

Louise:
Yeah, be careful now you don't insult us, we will run you out of here with a pitchfork!

[Laughter]

Mathias:
I was just gonna say if you ask someone for directions,

the first thing the person would say (is) ‘if I were you, I wouldn't, I wouldn't start from here!’

[laughter]

I wouldn't start from the measuring-up question because I think it's, because I think it's misleading.

We do have a number of sort of country rankings in education, I think the most, the one most people might be familiar with this, the PISA ranking -

Louise:
What is that now for people like me who have no idea what that is?!

Mathias:
It's the OECD, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, they run a standardised assessment of 15-year-olds in many countries.

And the word is called PISA - the Program for International Student Assessment.

So, they test 15-year-olds in several domains of knowledge and reading and understanding… and they come up with a country list and saying these countries are doing better than others.

Usually Finland wins. Sometimes South Korea wins, and then sort of, you have a discussion with other countries, why can't we be like South Korea?

We don't have that yet in early childhood, thankfully but we might have to talk about this a little later.

The thing about early childhood education and care is that it's so much embedded in how people think and feel what's important for themselves, for their families, for their children, for their communities.

The early childhood system that we have in Ireland is very much embedded in that sort of.. in the very specific, specific situation that we have in terms of close communities, in terms of family values.

There is no comparison, no meaningful comparison to say, how does this compare to Norway for instance, how does this compare to, I don’t know, France….

Louise:
Okay

Mathias:
What we can say, and I think there are there is quite a lot of information available around this, one of the issues that we face in Ireland is not the system...the services have been woefully underfunded for many, many years. When we look at OECD average, we're still at the bottom of the pile in terms of public investment that goes into the system.

Louise:
And why do you think that is?

Mathias:
Well, I suppose, it is not, it's not unique to early childhood, when you look at other services, we're in a similar position.

So, there's seems to be a reluctance in Ireland to actually invest adequately in in social services and to set up an infrastructure that actually works for children, for families and for society on the whole.

The other issue of course is it was never seen as the role of the State or of society as the whole, to get involved in the education of young children.

It was always seen as the primary area for the, for the, for the family, it goes back to the Constitution and all and this is why I say it is important to understand how people think this is how children should be reared, this is what bringing up children, children up is about in this country.

But we do have underfunding, we do have a still hopelessly fragmented landscape of services. We have an over reliance on private and often private for-profit provision, especially for services for the youngest children, which leads to high costs for parents.

It's ah, it's prohibitively high compared to other countries, which leads to an enormous pressure on wages and salaries for the educators, which are woefully low, and which leads to an enormous pressure quite often on the quality of the services that children experience. So nobody gains from this.

We do have a commitment from government, which has to be lauded, to actually increase investment, where total investment adds up over the years to 1 billion euro, that is a lot of money, but still leaves us way below OECD average.

We also have a sort of a policy tradition and again, that is, goes far beyond early childhood, that seems to, seems to be very reluctant to actually get involved proactively in managing services on, on the ground.

Louise:
And, I suppose, how does all of that link back into, you know, your research in the Institute of education? Like what, like what are your primary areas of research and it was, I mean, why are they so important?

Mathias:
I suppose, when we look at the research, at the research centre, we are a very sort of a mixed bunch of peoples, it's,

the technical term for this is interdisciplinary.

But we come from lots of different, different backgrounds, people from psychology background, from an education background, from sociology background.

I have an initial degree in pedagogy, and I worked as a practitioner many years ago with children from refugee families, and marginalised disadvantaged families.

So, we come from all different backgrounds. But we are mainly interested in the systems that surround young children that we set up as countries, as societies, to support young children and the families.

One of the things - and that's what gets us into this policy space - because what happens in your early childhood setting on a Tuesday morning, is very much hands on educators, families, children doing things, but it's also very much influenced and impacted by the policy landscape, the way that systems (are) governed, regulations are made, funding streams are organised.

So that's what we're interested in, in that space. What's happening in that space in Europe, and also internationally in recent years is not.. international organisations, policy bodies.. very different ones. and as diverse as let's say, the World Bank, UNICEF, the European Commission, they all are sort of players in that field of, of early childhood provision, and they all have ideas and suggestions and..

Louise:
the World Bank is?

Mathias:
the World Bank is one of the largest players in the field of education, mainly in the Global South.

Louise:
really?

Mathias:
yes (it) finances education reforms, finances early childhood development programmes all across Africa.

Between all these players, there seems to be a consensus emerging that we have to look at support services for young children in a holistic way, which is actually not rocket science.

But at these policy levels when you hear the World Bank talk about we need to look at systems, and we discovered that the programmes we are funding… they don't exist in a vacuum, but they're all embedded in sort of a very complex, social, economic, cultural context, then you know you're onto something.

And then so systems research is what we're doing. In that space, what's happening at the moment is not ….more and more experts globally are saying we need much more, we need to pay much more attention to the holistic systems around children.

And that means we can't just look at childcare or we can't just look at preparation for getting ready for school, but we have to look at what are the factors that actually impact on children's lives?

They are am I being cared for? Is that reliable? What's the education? Am I, do I, can I realise my rights to education, which is enshrined for instance in the fundamental Charter of Rights of the European Union. But also, am I going hungry?

Louise:
yeah

Mathias:
malnutrition is a major factor in...across the world and not just somewhere in Sub Saharan Africa.

Louise:
yeah, I know that's hard for people to believe that

Mathais:
Yes

Louise:
that could be an issue here in Ireland as easily as it could be as you say..

Mathias:
It is. Malnutrition is a growing issue in the UK and Ireland and many other sort, of very affluent countries.

Housing is a major influence on, has a major impact on how well children can develop their, their potential.

So what people are saying is that we have to look at this together.

Ireland is one of the countries in Europe that has adopted a strategy for young children, some years ago, published in 2018 that says we need a whole of government approach to...

Louise:
What is that now?

Mathias:
The document is called ‘first5’

Louise:
Okay.

Mathias:
and its subtitle is a whole of government strategy for babies, young children, and their families.

Which is a leading shift in thinking. What we're not seeing in Ireland yet is this whole of government approach actually happening.

Louise:
and is that kind of, what ye, are ye almost sort of lobbying, pushing for that ..

Mathias:
we're working, for instance, with the European Commission on policies, the European Union has just launched something that they call the European Child Guarantee, where they say children, especially the most vulnerable, need to have access to housing, to health, to welfare, to education, to care of high quality and member states, EU member states, need to make sure that happens.

So Ireland is, at the moment asked to go back to Brussels and say, actually this is how we're implementing this...

Louise:
Like how, like, obviously, because of, let's say, children in direct provision, like that housing is very, you know, I suppose unstable, like, how would Ireland go back to the European Union and say, yes, we have this system in place where children are in, as I said, sort of unstable housing, and we're trying to implement this programme as well.

Mathias:
Well, again, this is some… I'm trying to be, not to be critical

Louise:
I'm trying to get you in trouble here.

[Laughter]

Mathias:
I'm gonna be sacked right away.

[Laughter]

No, but sometimes what we're seeing, and I'm not saying this is what's going to happen in this case, but what we have been seeing before is requests came from the European Union to countries, including Ireland, to say how we are implementing these policies, that we've all agreed collectively, you get sort of ehm, games are being played.

So, you get one policy that refers to another policy, that refers back to the first policy, so you have a circle, but nothing really happens.

Louise:
Okay.

Mathias:
One infamous example is that the European Union some years ago asked all member states to come up with a National Traveller and Roma Integration Strategy.

How are you integrating your Roma population, your Traveller population in general services, in society, how does it happen?

Quite often countries sort of sent back education documents saying, oh we have an inclusive education system. Then they sent back a national sort of strategy that said actually we're working with education to make this happen, and it went round and round and round.

But the actual experience of Roma children in the northern part of Croatia or Traveller children in the halting side in Ballyfermot, have not improved.

Louise:
Yeah. That must be so frustrating when you're, I suppose, pushing to kind of make that, that change?

Mathias:
Well, it is and it isn't. And I suppose, I mean, it's.. you have to be in for the long haul, yes. You also have to be aware that you find allies in the most unexpected places.

And you also have to be aware that you have to engage with people in environments that are not necessarily the most comfortable ones.

So, I sometimes talk with colleagues, not at DCU but in sort of other forums, and they tell me, why would I want to engage with the European Commission? Life's too short for that.

[Laughter]

Louise:
that kind of kind of red tape yeah.

Mathias:
And I actually think if as an academic, you want to…if you don't want to restrict yourselves to constantly analysing policy, critiquing policy, but actually (want to) impacting policy, this is exactly where you need to be.

Louise:
Yeah.

Mathias:
And the connections again, between the global and the local - we were running a project at the moment, a very small scale project, we have some money from the Froebel Trust in London for this, where we work with families and educators and young children in the north inner city in Dublin but also in Ballymun in Dublin, about how they perceive their opportunity to actually play and how restricted that is and how they might imagine what things, what might be possible.

So, we're running a future workshop and with children, educators (and) families, and we're involving Dublin City Council in order to move from the fantasy, this is the wishful thinking part, to actually how we are going to make this happen.

So European Child Guarantee, restricted childhoods at European or global policy level are immediately connected to growing up in the north inner city.

And we're making these connections in our work.

Louise:
Yeah.

So earlier we talked about, like the difference between, you know, early childhood education in Ireland and in other countries in Europe and around the world.

And obviously, you know, you're not Irish, you grew up in Germany, you told me earlier, and yeah, so I suppose I'd love to hear a little bit about your experience of early childhood education or any teachers that, you know, that sort of spring to mind that were particularly inspirational in your education journey…

Mathias:
I had a few. I mean, and that's, and I think it's so important for, for us in institutions like higher education institutions to try and be that inspirational person.

I mean, I had someone when I first went to university doing something completely different, I met someone who gave me, gave me back my first paper that I wrote, and she, and she gave me two written feedbacks.

And the first feedback was actually ‘this is really interesting, you're making strong argument, and it's interesting to see what you're saying here. Brilliant, keep doing this.’

Then she gave me the second written feedback and said, ‘Mathias what on earth were you thinking?’

[laughter]

The way this is presented, I mean, have you ever heard of a comma before?!

Louise:
Yeah. That's a great way of doing it, though, so that you don't feel discouraged, you know, that there's kind of, she's still giving you the praise…

Mathias:
Yes. So, (there are) others that I learnt from in the university, outside of the university… I think the most outstanding examples were really people who were ready to give me a chance.

They didn't know me. They, they trusted me and they said, actually why don't you have a go?

And that helped me develop quite a lot in terms of getting my first research out, in terms of working with children and families…

Louise:
You know, I know with your research and with everything, you're sort of preparing the next generation of teachers to go out there and, and inspire others.

Mathias:
We're preparing the next generation of teachers, but also researchers and hopefully policymakers in this field.

Louise:
yeah, they all, as you said, they all play such crucial roles

Thank you so much for coming in today and for talking to me about this, this was a really interesting conversation.

Mathias:
Thank you.

Louise:
you can find out more about Teachers Inspire, and links to other episodes of the podcast, at TeacherInspire.ie and you can listen wherever you get your podcasts.

Until the next time.